


Against All Odds

by viridianmasquerade



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Anxiety, Ashen Romance | Auspistice, Black Romance, Caliginous Romance | Kismesis, Dream Bubbles, F/M, Fighting, Flushed Romance | Matesprits, Great big mess of troll romance, Pale Romance | Moirallegiance, Protectiveness, Quadrant Confusion, Red Romance, implied moirail feels anyway
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-27
Updated: 2014-04-27
Packaged: 2018-01-20 23:10:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 16,131
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1529219
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/viridianmasquerade/pseuds/viridianmasquerade
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Latula wants Cronus to be her kismesis, but she can't bring herself to admit it to Mituna. Naturally, Cronus being himself isn't helping anything. Mituna doesn't think he can handle the jealousy, but is trying to auspisticize between the two of them worth it?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Against All Odds

**Author's Note:**

> I apologize if Mituna's dialogue is hard to read; I couldn't think of any other way to effectively communicate his quirk without seeming to completely ignore it.
> 
> This, like my other longfic, was a lengthy labor of love (over a year in the works for this one!). Inspired by a conversation with Kisbe, it came out a little different than I initially imagined it would be, but I'm finally satisfied. I hope you guys are too.

Mituna's got a migraine; hell, ever since he broke his head he can't remember the last time it didn't hurt. It's pounding worse than usual now. It always gets bad when Cronus and Latula start fighting, and lately they've been fighting a lot. They've been at it so long today he can barely even remember what the violetblood did to start it this time. Whatever it was, Cronus was stupid enough to do it in front of Latula again. He’s been doing that more and more, like he doesn’t care if she sees. Or maybe like he wants her to, but that seems extra stupid to Mituna so he gets bored thinking about it.

Whatever Cronus' motives, it's getting really heated now; voices raised and her lip's all curled like she's going to bite something. For a second he can hear his pump sponge beating in his ears and his palms get sweaty. He's afraid suddenly, touched by an impulse to get up and get away right now. He feels the blood rush to his cheeks with shame. There's nothing to be so afraid of here, but he's losing it anyway, like a wiggler. A fractured sense of impending doom wells in him.

“Tulip!” he calls to her, but she doesn’t turn. He’s sitting on a lawnring several meters away from them, as far away from the fighting as he gets without leaving, and he never leaves without Latula. Not that he couldn’t, he just doesn’t like to. His brain doesn't hurt quite as much when she's around being so damn rad, can't figure out why but he likes it so it doesn't matter what the reason is. Kurloz helps a little too, that's why they're moirails (or maybe it's because they're moirails; Kurloz explained it to him once but he can't remember too well, fuzzy brain like always), but being around Latula is just better. And not only because they get to have sex.

“Latu-LA!” he shouts again, louder, cupping his hands in front of his mouth for extra volume even though yelling makes his head hurt even worse. Still, there’s no break in the yelling. He doesn’t even think they’re arguing about Cronus bullying him anymore. They’re just calling each other names and doing the flail thing with their hands a whole lot.

Mituna scrutinizes the fight through his visor, colors all distorted (he likes it that way; it hurts his eyes a little less, not as many shades and hues to process). Cronus has half a head on Latula at least, he's nearly Mituna's height, and just as skinny. Unlike Mituna, however, who brings to mind the word gangly, with his graceless too-long limbs, Cronus is wiry and coordinated. He, Mituna thinks enviously, has never fallen face-first off his own two feet just because he stopped concentrating for a minute. On the other hand, not even Porrim will sleep with him, a thought which cheers the yellowblood immensely.

Latula, though she is medium-tall compared to the other trolls in their dreambubble, is the shortest of the three here, but is also the most athletic, with sick strong thighs from grinding rails so much. Mituna wonders for a minute if she could beat Cronus in a straight fight, pure coolkid skate muscle versus highblood strength, and decides she could, but also, with a flicker of jealous anxiety, that he doesn't want that to be a thing that happens.

He flops back in the grass moodily, glaring up at the half-shattered sky and wishing Cronus would just leave him alone so Latula wouldn't have to fight with him. But no matter how much Mituna yells or swears or even apologizes for yelling and swearing, Cronus never stops. So neither does Latula.

He knows Latula just wants to protect him, because she’s a knight and that’s what knights do, but he'd like it better if she would quit fighting with Cronus. Yelling at a wader never did anyone any good, everyone knows they can't hear you right anyway with those stupid-looking fins they use for hear ducts. Used to be she would yell a little then take Mituna away to their secret beach hideout to watch the waves, and he liked that. He could spaz out for a bit and then he’d say he was sorry and she’d be all rad and cool and make him laugh and then they'd fuck and he'd feel better. Lately she's been getting angrier with Cronus, sticking around to argue for longer, and not so quick to take Mituna away to their hideout.

She says it's because she's tired of Cronus bullying him so much. She says he shouldn't have to run away. She says she wants Cronus to know they are going to stand their ground. And he guesses he’s okay with all of that, because yeah, it would be great if Cronus left him alone, but he just thinks all her yelling is making everything worse instead of better.

And she’s spent so much time and energy bickering with Cronus these last few days that there’s barely been any left over for him, and today, he’s finally had enough. His head's pounding, full to bursting with splinters of doom, and the volume of their voices is a weight pressing on him. He needs to be elsewhere, anywhere but where he is, even if for the first time in a long time, he needs to leave Latula behind.

He pulls himself to his feet awkwardly, using his falldown slab to balance. It takes long enough (and looks stupid enough, he's sure) that the other two finally slow down their arguing to look at him. Now he’s even more upset, because they only stopped to stare, they aren't even trying to help him.

The highblood jams his hands in the pockets of his ridiculous leather jacket and waves at Mituna. It looks dumb and awkward to Mituna but for some reason he can't work out, Cronus thinks it's some kind of coolkid move. Whatever. "Where ya goin', fella?" Cronus tilts his head like he's concerned and pastes on a so-friendly smile that he thinks looks genuine, that stupid human cigarette hanging out of his teeth like it grew there. Mituna's head may be broke all to hell but he still knows bullshit when he sees it. Bullshit is Cronus through and through, and all it does is spark Mituna's temper.

"Anywhere elthe but fucking not bear. Ear. Here. Whatever! Fuck off!" Mituna speaks like he's throwing whole words into a blender; what comes out is syllable grubsauce, slurred and spilling everywhere. It takes a while to get the knack of hearing him right the first time. Not many people bother. Cronus acts like he shouldn't have to, and that's just one more thing Mituna can't stand about him.

"Tunez?" Latula turns to look at her matesprit with a quizzical look on her face, stepping closer to him.

"Don't, don't, don't even!" he yells at her. "Fucking go fall face-first off a rail!" It wasn’t even close to what he’d wanted to say but it was the first thing that came out. He's got all these words buzzing like wasps on his tongue and they're so noisy he can't pick one to yell next. _I didn't mean that. Stop yelling at him. Come with me. I love you. You don't need to fight with him right now._ He wants to explain, but everything's a jumble. Being angry's making it harder than usual and he can't make any of it work so he just says nothing. His hands are starting to shake.

She looks stunned. Her mouth opens. Closes. Opens again and just hangs there. He knows he's fucked up big time. Mituna never, ever, loses his temper at her. Around her, sure, all the time. But never at her. It's not like it's a rule, it's just something he does and he's proud of it in his own way because he loves her. But now he's gone and fucked it up like the asshole he is. He still can't get the words out. Scared he'll say something worse if he sticks around, he stomps off as fast as he can go, cheeks burning yellow with anger and embarrassment, leaving Latula and Cronus staring at him.

There's a long silence. Then hushed whispers, and a loud crack of glove on cheek. He doesn't look back.

* * *

 

Cronus leers at Latula as the yellowblood turns his back, running a hand through his so-slick swept-back hair. He lets Mituna get almost out of earshot before opening his mouth. “Trouble in paradise, babe?” he asks, under his breath. He’s getting a kick out of the stunned look on her pretty little heart-shaped face. “Always knew you’d come around to my sensitive, artistic approach in the end. A gorgeous thing like you can’t exactly pity-fuck a drooling numbskull forever, right?” He lays on the accent a little thicker. Everyone knows accents are sexy, especially his extra-aristocratic seadweller drawl.

“Shut your nook,” she hisses, “I love Mituna.”

The seadweller folds his arms and leans back to get a good look at her, smirking around his cigarette. “I dunno, Tulip,” enjoying the way she grits her teeth when he calls her that, “it kinda looks to me like he just left and you’re still here chatting me –”

She reaches up and slaps him, once, hard enough to snap his head to the side. “Way don’t even,” she growls. "I just want you to leave him the hell alone."

He puts a hand over his cheek, glaring down at her angrily. As if he's going to let an uppity lowblood - a lowblood who oughta been culled in any world that made sense - put her hands on him that way! A beat passes; he remembers he's way too cool and collected to make a big deal out of his incredibly high position on the hemospectrum that like that. Visibly calming himself, he straightens up and grins widely, purple handprint still stinging on his cheek. “Oh, you want it black, huh? Hey, that’s cool too. Whatever floats your boat, pretty lady.”

“As if, chode.” She flips him the bird and stalks off, four-wheel device under one arm. Pft. Dames. She'll come back, he knows it. Eventually someone has to fall to his charms (red or black, he doesn't even care anymore, it's that bad) and Cronus has decided it's going to be her. Meantime, he watches her ass 'til she's out of sight. He hates to see her leave, but boy, does he ever love to watch her go. Good thing she doesn't turn around and catch him doing it. Although, he considers, smirking, that might be fun too.

* * *

 

Latula's pump sponge is beating like crazy as she walks away, practically biting her own tongue to remind herself not to turn around and see if Cronus is still looking. Not that she thinks he isn't, but she's determined not to give him the satisfaction of seeing her check. She feels a guilty smile coming on but manages to control herself, just in case someone sees. She really didn't think she was going to slap him until she actually went and did it, and now she's wondering what he'll do next time they cross paths, guilt creeping in because she knows she should be worrying about Mituna's temper tantrum. And she is! She's walking towards their hideout to hug him better, although maybe she's walking a little slower than she should be.

Latula takes a deep shaky breath and exhales all a shudder, finally admitting to herself what she's been guiltily denying for the past few weeks: she's harsh waxing caliginous for the seadweller. And she may have been putting her blackflirting ahead of her matespritship a little. A lot. Badly enough that Mituna's lost his temper with her for the first time in who knows how long. In fact, she's not sure if he's ever shouted at her before, and the fact that he's gotten so frustrated that he actually would – well, that just makes her feel even more like a chode.

She still loves Mituna just as much as she ever did. That he needs her, and that she needs to protect him, will never stop being a thing that's true. What she feels for him is practically written in the stars. Knight and heir; it's a matespritship that just works and she's never questioned it (plus, the pailing is top-notch; after so many sweeps together it would have to be). But that doesn't mean she doesn't want to fill some other quadrants.

Mituna's always been jealous of her few forays into black romance because it takes her attention away from him. She knows it's not entirely fair to her, not really, but she does her best to keep them to a minimum anyway, for Mituna's sake. It took him almost a sweep to stop being anxious about Porrim, even after it ended, and she hadn't wanted to put him in that state again, even if it is frustrating to bite down those instincts. Even worse without having a moirail to go to, but the idea of needing a moirail is unthinkable. Knights don't need protecting, don't need culling or coddling. Saving people is her job, not the other way around.

As good as she's gotten at ignoring her other quadrants, it could never last forever. Recently she's been feeling a serious hankering for a good hate date. It's been literal eons, afer all. Sometimes a girl just has to get her kismesitude on.

She hadn't set out with Cronus in mind, but the way he kept picking fights with her over Mituna was kind of appealing, in a gross and totally horribly caliginous way. It was a knight thing, she'd decided, that ache to protect things and people, and she simply didn't get a whole lot of chance to do that in the dream bubbles. Protecting Mituna from Cronus was a chance to act like a real knight again, sort of.

It didn't hurt that Cronus was actually kind of handsome, for a total scuzz-bucket grease-head. That leather jacket white shirt combo actually managed to look good on him, even though it was a total pretentious asshole human poser thing to wear. Even that ridiculous slicked-back hair of his worked, inexplicably. It’s a dumb human haircut he spends way too much time preening over but she kind of likes it on him. Maybe because it’s so utterly different from Mituna’s doesn’t-give-a-shit dandelion poof (which she loves in its own way).

Up until today she'd been telling herself she was only passingly interested in Cronus. Only a little bit in hate with him. Nothing serious; she kept thinking she would do just a little bit more flirtatious fighting and then it would pass and then she wouldn't even have to tell Mituna anything about it! He wouldn't have to be jealous, they wouldn't have to fight about it, he wouldn't have to panic that she was leaving him (as if she ever would, but she just can't get that through to him even after all this time). It would have been smooth sailing just like always.

But after what just happened, she has to be honest with herself – she does want the seadweller, and Mituna's not going to like that. If she can just calm him down a bit then maybe they can talk about it. She can see him a little ways away now, sitting watching the waves on their secret beach, helmet on the sand beside him. Time to go make things right. She takes a deep breath and puts on her raddest most with-it vibe because she knows Mituna loves it and maybe it’ll help smooth things over.

* * *

 

Footsteps crunch in the sand behind him, but Mituna doesn’t bother turning around. Nobody else but him and Latula ever come here, so it has to be her and anyway he’s still pretty mad and doesn’t want to yell at her by accident again so he just stays put and keeps his mouth shut, breathing in the warm salt air, trying to keep calm.

"Hey babe," she says, sitting down next to him. She puts a tentative hand on his fluffy hair. He shrugs it off angrily and huffs, draws his knees up to his chest and hugs his arms around them; defenses up.

Silence, just the sound of waves and the blue of the sky for a long time until he feels like the buzzing in his head is settled enough that he can talk.

He takes a deep breath, trying to be calm and getting nowhere with it. "I fracking hate him, I hate him, I hate that goddamn wader finhead thinks he’s so fucking grrrrrrrrreat,” he gets stuck on the 'rrr' sound and wants to bite his tongue off in frustration even though it's his brain not his tongue that's what's wrong, “and you're sp-sp-spending more time with him that, than you are with me!”

Latula sighs, taking off her glasses. “I’m sorry, Tunez. I harsh didn’t mean to make you sad,” looking at him with guilt in her apologetic half-smile.

It’s the way she says it, that not-apology, because he’s not sad and he’s pretty sure she ought to know that. “Not sad I’m pithed, uh, pished, argh! PISSED!” Shit, he can’t even get the words out, he’s tripping all over the sounds and he wishes he could do this better so she’d understand without having to puzzle through his stuttering.

“I know, I –"

“No! No, nonono DON’T.” And now he’s doing the flail thing with his arms which he doesn’t want to be doing but he’s all worked up again because he knows she really doesn’t know but she says she does. “You jutht argue with him for so fucking LONG and then you don have any time for me ATALL.”

“Of course I do! We like, come right back here after, always, don’t we?”

“Yeah,” he says morosely, wrapping his arms around his knees again with maximum petulance.

“You’re my gamebro, like, always.” She puts an arm around him and this time he lets her.

But, he thinks, as she settles her head down on his shoulder, she’s still avoiding saying she's sorry for the thing that made him mad, and that makes him angry all over again. And even though really he just wants to let it go and chill with his rad gamegirl matesprit, he can't 'cause it'll still be there just as ugly as before. He doesn't want her arm on him anymore and he jumps up stumbling, jarring her from where she rests against him.

“Ow, Tuna!” she cries out, scrambling up to her feet. “What gives?”

“You thtill just alwayth FIGHT with him for EVER and it sucks really hard and you didn't even try to thay you were slorry! And and, I want for you to not do that anymore okay!”

And the look in her dead-white eyes breaks his heart because he can see before she even says it that she’s black for awful fucking Cronus, actually wants him to fill up a quadrant with her. She hasn't just been arguing with Cronus, she’s been hateflirting all this whole time and she was hiding it from him. It was awful enough with Porrim (she’s so pretty he thought Latula was going to stay with her forever and forget all about him and he knows every day he's so lucky she didn't) but with Cronus? How could she lie to him like that? How could she ever think it would be okay? He's the worst kind of bully, he is to Mituna and why would it be any different with anyone else? He'll hurt her, really actually hurt her like a kismesis isn't supposed to and Mituna knows he'll never be able to handle that, never mind his jealousy.

“I…Tunez, babe, I know you don’t want to hear this but,” she takes a deep breath, looks down away from him to the soft golden sand, can’t even make eye contact. Bites her lip. “I think I hate him. Blackrom hate him. And -”

“I FUCKING ACTUAL HATE HIM!” he explodes, voice so clear it startles both of them. Blue and red sparking from his eyes now, he’s that worked up. Like he’s never even been before that he can remember, and never ever to her. _Bitch, bitch, stupid rotten blueblood bitch_ , and he doesn’t want to even be thinking that because he loves her and she's not a bitch and she’s always been there for him and it’s not even a little bit fair for him to even think it but _how could you, you bitch_. He can’t stand Cronus, his shitty fucking music and his dumb hair and his hands always touching and he’s so mean all the time. He's so mean and he's going to be so awful to her.

Mituna knows he says mean stuff himself too but he can’t help it, his brain’s all busted. And anyway he broke it saving everyone's lives, not that they appreciate it; maybe they should be happy they're alive to hear him say all the dumb stuff he does. There's nothing he can do to stop any of it coming out in any case, words all swarming like bees (except around Latula, never, never before to Latula). But Cronus could stop if he wanted to, it's just that he likes being awful and that’s what Mituna really hates about him. Cronus doesn’t ever stop even though he could.

Why did it have to be Cronus?

“I fucking HATE him,” he says again, but he’s swinging back to sad now, sparks gone and fury subsiding. All the rad's gone out of Latula too, like somebody switched off the lights. She reaches out and puts a gloved hand on his shoulder, but she's keeping her distance now like she never has before and it stings.

“Chill, Tuna,” she says quietly, matching his low tone, “I know you hate him, yeah? I way don't want him to give you shit anymore, I so want him to stop. I want to protect you. But I'm feeling black for him, and you know how you get when I feel black...”

She's still talking, explaining, but he's not listening to anything she's saying, tunnel vision shrinking the whole world down to a pinpoint of doom. He’s going to lose her finally like he’s always known he would every time she feels caliginous for someone. That’s why he gets so jealous even though he knows it isn't really fair for him to be, just can't help it. He's always known she's too amazing for him and as soon as she gets a taste of something different, something better, she's going to know what she's been missing and he'll lose her to somebody whose brain isn't all splinters. It's so much more awful though, that of all people it’s going to be to the worst troll in all of paradox space and what if he hurts her?

“Sorry,” he mumble-slurs, head all full of buzzing doom so he can't even think, and she's making it worse this time instead of better, “thorry. I'm g-g-gonna go. I need to. Go. Gotta see Kurloz.” He turns and walks off, leaving her behind for the second time that day. It's getting to be a habit and he wishes it wasn't. She lets her hand fall from his shoulder and doesn't say a word.

* * *

 

Meenah's just shot Cronus down hard again (for the six hundred and twelth time this sweep, the bitch; he keeps count) and he's stalking away angrily with his hands shoved in his jeans pockets, embarassment burning on his lean face, when he sees Mituna tooling around on his falldown slab. Perfect. He hasn't seen him or Latula, come to think of it, in a few days, so the fact that he's here alone right now just when Cronus is working up a real ugly temper feels like destiny throwing him a bone for once. As Cronus walks up, Mituna catches sight of him and startles, taking a seriously groovy-looking faceplant off the railing right into the grass. Even better.

“Hey, moron,” he snaps, walking up and toeing him in the side with one scuffed leather boot, “sweet trick. You looked pretty cool falling on your face like that.”

“No,” Mituna says, frowning, rubbing absently at the grass stains on his cheeks. He looks around, all hopeful and puppy-eyed under his visor. Kind of cute, actually, in a pathetic kind of way. Probably looking for Latula, but she's a little late to the party. Ten to one she's looking to make a dramatic entrance; the girl always had a taste for that, even as far back as SGRUB. Always dashing in at the last second trying to make herself look good, taking attention away from the real heroes like him.

But that's fine, gives him a little uninterrupted time to spend with his good friend Mituna. He grins, thinking how fortunate it is that the mustardblood's other guardian asshole, that creepy silent weirdo Kurloz, is also not going to be making an appearance. He doesn't show up often, but Cronus can't stand the guy, so it really puts a damper on his day when he does.

According to Meulin, who couldn't keep her big mouth shut for all the boonbucks in paradox space, the stars have come into 'felinement' so Kurloz has gone off to do the glorious work of the angel of double death and won't be back for a few days. When he'd asked her what the hell she was talking about she'd shrugged and said she had no idea, that it was something Kurloz had told her that thought was interesting so she was telling him. Broads! Honestly. They clam right up about anything important, but hell, do they ever love to talk about nothing at all. Especially Meulin.

As irritating as she is, he secretly enjoys hanging out with Meulin. She's too busy babbling about shipping her precious gay babies (whatever that means) to be a bitch to him like most of the other ladies in this dreambubble. He can't get a word in edgewise half the time, which is annoying, but it's a break from getting shot down hard.

“Whats'a matter, I'm only kidding around, bud.” He jabs Mituna in the side a little more. “You need to get yourself a sense'a humor, the broads love that.” Cronus smirks. He's starting to feel better already. Latula's obviously gonna show up in a minute looking all like a furious avenging sex kitten to tell him not to pick on her precious little fuckup and that's gonna improve the day even more.

He can't help it, she looks so appealing when she's angry. The way she curls her lip up at him and thinks it's threatening is just too adorable. Sure, it may have stung when she slapped him the other day but he knows she couldn't go toe-to-toe with him, not really, and that's why he enjoys it so much when she acts like she could. “Speakin'a ladies, where's Latula gone? You'd think she'd here by now white-knighting your crippled a – whoops, uh, sorry pal, I meant to say uh,” laying on the friendliness so thick you could spread it on nutrition loaf, “your severely handicapped ...rear.” He knows Mituna hates euphemisms as much or more than the insults they mask.

Mituna closes his eyes and curls up on his side, holding the falldown slab. Doesn't respond. Cronus is beginning to lose the very little patience he had left.

“What gives? You're all quiet on me, buddy. Somethin' wrong?”

“No.”

Cronus frowns, crouches down next to Mituna, and pulls his helmet over none-too-gently so he can look him in the face. “Don't be rude like that, mate, I asked you to tell me what's wrong. I'm tryin' to help.”

“No.”

“Somethin' happen with you two?” Come to think of it, Cronus has never seen them apart this long before. There must be something wrong – oh. Oh!

His eyes go wide and he nearly drops his cigarette. “She dumped you? She finally dumped you? Aw, man, I am so incredibly sorry. Really, you don't even know.” He gives Mituna's shoulder a firm and friendly squeeze, already envisioning Latula naked, sprawled in his blanket pile like a centerfold in Penthive. And maybe as a bonus he'll be able to get with Mituna too. He's a drooling numbskull but he could still be fun sometime if Latula wasn't up for it. One black, one red, hell, they could even go in for a little quadrant vacillation maybe, exactly like a Penthive spread. Day just keeps getting better and better, unwarranted rejection from Meenah aside.

“No, no no no no,” Mituna repeats, a little louder, trying to push the seadweller's hand off his shoulder. Between Cronus' violetblooded strength and Mituna's spazzed-out shakiness, it isn't happening.

“Hey, where do you get off thinking you can put a hand on me, huh?” Cronus growls, face darkening. Day's better but his mood isn't yet. He's had enough of peasantbloods thinking they can get fresh with him these days and this really is just the last straw. Nobody of his aristocratic stature should have to put up with shit like this, that's for sure (not that he likes to make a big deal of it, but a man of his impressive bloodline deserves a modicum of respect). Especially when he's trying to be friendly! He smacks Mituna's hand away, then raises his hand to hit him again, teach him a lesson, and that's when somebody belts him one across the back of the skull.

* * *

 

“Hey dipshit, pretty sure he said no way ho-say,” Latula says, looking down at Cronus all sprawled out on the grass next to Mituna. She's wearing a satisfied grin that goes from hear duct to hear duct; rad girl to the rescue! She lowers her four-wheel device into a defensive position, waiting.

Mituna starts to say something but Cronus barks right over him, “What the hell, you crazy broad!” The seadweller staggers to his feet, turning to face her. There's a thin line of violet blood trickling down his the side of his neck, which he is pointedly ignoring. She must've got him pretty damn good, she thinks.

“I've had like, way more than enough of your shit, Cronus. Let's rumble, hood.” Mixing in a little human greaser slang deliberately to try and irritate him.

Which it does. “Whoa, whoa, there's no need to make fun of my unique human dialect, okay? It's hard enough being tragically born in the wrong body and not getting any sympathy from anyone and I don't need crap from you about it.” He folds his arms, glaring at her.

“Whatever.” Latula turns to Mituna, who's scrambled to his feet in the meantime and is backing away with his own falldown slab in hand. “Hey Tuna, you okay, babe? Sick entrance, right?” Ever since their huge fight, she's been following him around looking for an opportunity to come to his rescue in the raddest way possible to prove how much she loves him. Seems like she got here just in time. Maybe she can salvage this and make it out looking like a hero.

“I'm not here floor you to m-m-make an enthrance!”

“Excuse me, you're just gonna sock me one and then walk away to talk to this bozo? I don't think so.”

Latula looks over her shoulder towards Cronus, who is advancing towards threateningly her with some kind of little knife in his hand. It looks ridiculous. She snorts derisively, curling her upper lip. “Yo, didn't know you changed your strife specibus to like, wigglertoykind.” She can't help herself, everything about him is so terrible. Every time he opens his mouth she feels a rush of black lust, just wants to punch him square in his ugly handsome face and then kiss it real mean, leave bruises all over his lips. Mituna fades into the background around that feeling, no more than an abstract ideal her knight side wants to protect.

“It's a switchblade, and I'll have you know it's the weapon of choice for tragically outcast humans like myself. You'd know that if you ever bothered to listen when I talk about my poetically heart-rending condition.” Latula rolls her blank white eyes, to little effect.

“What the FUCK, you A-A-ASSHOLES!” Mituna screams at them, top of his lungs, garbled and awkward. Both Cronus and Latula turn and look. He points at Cronus, then makes a rare and highly offensive gesture towards him with both hands. “You suck! Donut touch me! Ever! I hate you!” Latula opens her mouth to speak and he points at her now, “Leaf, lead, LEAVE ME ALONE!” He shakes his head, stumbling back away from them both, “jutht go fight with the w-w-wader if that ith the thing you came here to do.”

There's a sharp intake of breath from Cronus. Latula shoots him a glance over her shoulder. He's seething, nostrils flaring. There's blood smeared on his neck and shirt. He looks rage-filthy, dangerous.

“Come on, babe, we should go,” she says.

“No! Leave m-m-me alone!”

“Tuna - “

“No! You jutht came to f-f-fight with him, g-g-go do it then.”

She shifts her weight nervously, looking back at the seadweller again. His wide white eyes are fixed on Mituna, knuckles clenched and pale around his little knife.

“No, I'm here to protect you, Tuna.” This is not the excellent redemption rescue scene she'd planned for. Okay, admittedly, she's kind of getting her argue on with Cronus now, but she saved Mituna just when it was coolest to do so, which ought to count for something. He's not as grateful as she kind of hoped he might be. Latula's a showboat by nature, doesn't really know what else to do for an apology besides rolling up and being awesome as hard as possible. It's never not worked with Mituna before. She's kind of at a loss for what to do.

“You're just here for doing more flighting with the thtupid chumbucket!” Latula gasps. As caste-based slurs go, that's even worse than wader, and Cronus is already in a temper like a tempest.

The violetblood lets out a strangled cry of rage and rushes Mituna, switchblade out. Tiny as it is, it looks a lot more threatening when it's pointed at the love of her afterlife. “What did you just call me, you puke-blooded peasant? I'm gonna carve you a new one!” It's obvious he's way past just posturing to provoke Latula now; he's coming at her matesprit, murder in his dead eyes. Caliginous crush or not, she'll beat him to a second death before she lets him lay so much as a hand on Mituna.

Mituna throws up his falldown slab like a shield, mumbling “sorry” over and over at top speed like it's going to stop Cronus' assault. Latula takes off after the seadweller, pump sponge beating like never before, panicked and guilty. If Mituna gets hurt, it's going to be all her fault, provoking Cronus when she should have been taking Mituna away to safety. She pushes herself and manages to close the distance before Cronus does, never more grateful for all the time she's wasted skateboarding, making her legs strong and fast.

“If you go anywhere near him I will fucking kill you!” She swings at Cronus with her board, surprised to find he's fast enough to duck it. But he's turned on her now, snarling, slashing with his little knife, and that's just fine. As long as he stays away from Mituna.

They trade blows, board against blade. The switchblade is small but fast; her board is broad but slow. She uses its size to her advantage, swinging to block and parry as he slashes at her. It's been a long time since she's done any fighting. Too long, but it's coming back to her enough to hold her ground, and even press her advantage, swinging the board in heavy axe blows meant to break bone. It makes a good shield but it's by no means perfect; more than once he's too fast for her and she winds up with slash marks up and down her arms, teal blood spattering everywhere as she swings back at him.

Cronus' snarl of rage has twisted into a look she can't figure out, but she's too intent on beating him down to wonder what it signifies. “You don't touch him! You don't even THINK about touching him, understand?” Not even bothering with the rad-girl bullshit now, too angry to keep up the neurotic facade, she's redoubling her assault. She hasn't felt like this since the game. It's past being satisfying, past being sexy and black and deep into something much nastier: the sheer sick sweetness of cracking bones. “Try to hurt him again and I'll break every bone in your body!” Now Latula understands the expression the violetblood is wearing: disbelief, and a little bit of fear. Good. He's remembering SGRUB.

“He needs to learn a little respect for his betters,” he spits, all forced defiance, flashing his sharp shark teeth. But it's smoke and mirrors. She can see him cracking.

“You. Don't. TOUCH. Him,” she pants. She can see Mituna, a bright yellow slash in her peripheral vision, standing stock still, balling his hands into fists. Vaguely she wonders why. Maybe she's lost him forever now but she's not going to let Cronus hurt him, not ever. Especially not when it would be her fault.

The whole fight has taken maybe a minute, but it feels like an hour. Breath comes heavy; her arms burn with exertion. She's strong but she's not sure if she can keep this up, and all she can hope for is that he can't either. Finally, after too long, after she's left him with a body full of bruises and he's slashed her all to hell and back, finally, he falls for a stumble that's only half a feint, and leaves an opening in his defense. Latula takes a swing and cracks him solidly in the ribs, knocking him down to the ground. She dashes forward and plants her board on his neck, glaring down at Cronus from behind her glasses. He has room to breathe, but barely.

“You know, I actually felt black for you, you groady scrub!” Rad girl slang sneaking in again under the anger. “I like, don't even know what I was thinking!”

He splutters at her. “You do?” Of all things, he looks surprised.

“As if! Past tense, loser. Way past tense.” She digs the board in a little deeper. “Every bone in your body, Cronus. You come near him again ever and it'll be every single bone in your body, you think you can get that through your thick skull?” Lifts the board up, noting the thick purple bruise already coming up on his throat. Maybe that'll learn him. She turns on her heel and walks over to Mituna. She can hear Cronus coughing and gasping behind her.

“Tunez,” she bites her lip, hoping he'll listen, “I'm really sorry. About everything.”

* * *

 

“He heard, herd, hurt you,” he says, unballing one shaking fist and pointing to her wounded arms. He knew this would happen. Cronus is the most awful troll in paradox space and there was no way he wasn't going to hurt her bad and he swears that it's not the jealousy speaking, not really, not only that anyway. “That'th not right Tulip, you're a-a-all cut up, that'th not black that'th jutht awful! And ith just gonna keep being more awful!”

“No, that's,” she hesitates, “that was different! That wasn't black, it wasn't -”

“Oh, like hell that wasn't black,” Cronus interrupts when she hesitates again, voice rough and bruised. He's pulled himself to his knees, coughing, and Mituna watches him carefully for any sign of violence, but he shows no sign of getting up, let alone attacking.

“Put a sock in it, meathead, I said past tense and I hella meant it,” Latula snaps, over her shoulder.

He wants to believe her, he really does. He can tell that she even believes it, right now anyway. But he was watching them fight and he saw their matespritship doomed in every slash and parry, every step and feint and he can't let Cronus hurt her like that again, he loves her so much. And, well, if she's going to leave him anyway like he's always feared she would he might as well try.

“Listen, bitch – ”

Mituna stumbles over between them. “Both of you fucking thtop!” he shouts, throwing his arms wide to keep them apart. “Thtop please I want t-t-that, thtopping is to be a thing that is happening. No more fighting!” he swallows nervously, looking at Latula, only Latula. Anxiety makes chunky grubsauce of every syllable. “Evlen, even if I half, no, h-h-have to slop, stop y-y-you myshelf!” He's never tried to auspisticize before, no idea if he's doing it right but somehow it seems right. It feels like breathing ashes.

It dawns on Cronus first, what he's doing. Mituna can see it in the widening of his eyes. He opens his mouth to say something (actually dropping his stupid human cigarette), thinks twice and shuts it again.

Latula's a second later to catch on, grabbing him by the shoulders when she does. “What are you doing, Mituna?” No rad-girl slang now, voice pitching up, almost squeaking. Concern, confusion.

“M-m-making thure you don get hurt moar!” He pushes her hands off him gently, taking care not to touch where she's been cut. It doesn't need to be any harder than it already is.

“You can't, you, we'll, we,” she's stammering just like he does now, can't get the words out in anything resembling order. He sympathizes, leans forward to kiss her cheek. Eyes wide and brimming, she gets it sorted at last. “We can't be matesprits if you're auspisticizing!”

“Y-y-yeah,” he says, to the ground because it's too hard to say it to her face. “But.” He glances over at Cronus, who is standing now, staring, not saying a word. Just staring, mouth open again. “But I donwan you two gret h-h-hurt again tho this ith watt I wanna do inthtead.”

“Mituna, no, you don't have to, I don't want to be black with - “

He cuts her off. “Budd eye know you do 'cause you thaid and, and thith way w-w-we canthill be together becauth otherwise we,” he stumbles, words all coming out as a swarm, “we, it won't, I c-c-can't, we can't, it'th doomed I, I saw it tho, so, it hath to be like t-t-thith.” He can feel doom singing in his veins and he's so sure for once this is the right thing to do. It fixes everything. He'll still be with her, even if it's different. Cronus won't be hurting her. He won't have to be jealous or anxious and it'll all be okay for once. He's so sure he's got the fragmented visions in the right order this time, so sure. “It hath t-t-two.”

* * *

 

“You have gotta be FUCKING kidding me,” the seadweller spits in a voice like a bruise. “That's your big solution?”

Mituna nods sullenly at him.

“Like I wanna be part of some big happy conciliatory group hug with you two.” Pornographic visions of quadrant-vacillating threesomes spiral down the drain, replaced with platonic sit-down talks about feelings. While normally he'd be the first one to jump on talking about feelings (since you apparently can't get laid in this dreambubble if you're not a broken loser with an overabundance of hurt feelings), being auspisticized is the farthest thing from getting laid in all of paradox space and he wants zero part of it. Furthermore, this entire situation is a load of high-grade bullshit.

“Shut up, Cronus!” Latula says thickly. He can see tears pooling in her white eyes. Pathetic.

“Naw, you know what, sister? I don't think I will. This whole thing here?” he waves his hand, “it's bullshit.” It is so much bullshit and he is so tired of it. He's the one getting casteist dysphoria-triggering speciesist slurs flung in his face, he's the one with the broken ribs, he's the one who got a falldown slab shoved practically down his throat, and Mituna's trying to make out like he's the problem here? No way is that little piss-blooded peasant getting away with that.

“Don't act like this spaz here's so innocent,” upping the volume to talk over Latula as she tries to interrupt, “You heard what he said to me! He hadda know I'd get hacked off! The c-word isn't something you get to just throw around willy-nilly, and everyone knows I'm especially sensitive to caste-based insults since I ain't even a damn troll! No way he wasn't aiming to jump bad.”

“He wasn't, you know he didn't mean it, he just says stuff, Cronus.” She's blinking the tears away, or trying to.

“Hey - “ Mituna starts. Cronus doesn't want to hear it.

“Oh, so he gets to just beak off about whatever the hell he likes and I gotta keep my lid on because what, exactly?” He rubs his aching throat.

“Cronus,” she says, in a warning tone. But he's not in the mood to be warned.

“Hey!” No one's paying attention to Mituna, as usual.

“No, seriously, Tulip,” grinning as she grits her teeth, “You'd flip your lid if I called him a name like that, so what gives, huh? He gets to mouth off and then decide he's gonna auspisticize us because he's jealous?”

Latula glances down, looking like she wants to say something but can't, and Cronus grins. He's got her now. “Oh, I get it. He gets free rein to do whatever the hell he wants because he's a crippled spazbucket and you can't say no to him because it might hurt his widdle feelings. Never fucking mind mine.” He pauses thoughtfully. “Or yours.”

That struck a nerve. “Don't you ever - “ Latula says, and raises her board again.

“See what I mean? You broads and your double standards, one for me and one for everybody else. Good work, 'Tunez', I thought you were a moron but it turns out you're working her like a pro.” He's so fed up he's not even thinking about what this is doing to his chances of getting Latula naked.

“I didn't MEAN to!” Mituna shouts over him, “I d-d-din't mean to but you're the most awful, you say awful things to me awl the time and y-y-your brain isn't even busted like m-m-mine!”

“You're brain's too busted to be an auspistice, that's for sure,” he sneers, avoiding Mituna's actual point. Everyone knows Cronus has a temper, anyway, just like any proper highblood, so maybe people shouldn't go around provoking it all the time. Maybe if he had a kismesis to let off a little steam once in awhile he wouldn't be getting to this point in the first place. “You're breaking up a matespritship with a babe you got wrapped around your little finger just to keep her and I from getting into a kismesitude we both wanna be in? Good fuckin' logic there, pal. Good fuckin' logic.” Shakes his head. “Well, I ain't biting, that's for damn sure. You can keep your girl, moron. Sure as hell not worth dealing with you in the bargain.” He flips his middle finger at the two of them and stalks away.

* * *

 

“Fuck you anyway, douche!” Latula shouts at him, and it does not make her feel better in the slightest. She bites her lip, turns back to Mituna for a conversation she very badly does not want to finish. “You... you really want be our auspistice, Mituna?” No use trying to blink away tears now, they're spilling down her face and she doesn't care. With Cronus gone, there's no one here she needs to hide from anyway. “You don't want to be my matesprit anymore?” She never in a million sweeps thought she'd be saying those words. Choking on them.

“N-n-no, Latula, it'th dloomed, you don geddit, I thaw, I know - ”

“You're right,” she says, cutting him off, “I DON'T get it. I don't get it at all!” She flings her hands up in frustration. “You're scared, I know! But Tuna, is it really worth destroying everything we have together? To replace it with grey?”

“He's g-g-gonna hurt you!”

“What are you even talking about? Didn't you see us back there? Don't you remember SGRUB? There's not a thing he can do to me worse than I could do to him and you KNOW it. And that's not what a kismesitude is about, Tunez, not really. It's romance, not real fighting like that.” She curls her hands into fists at her sides. “You know that, all of that, so talk to me about what this is really about. Please.”

He turns his back on her and mumbles, “I can't.”

Latula grabs his shoulder. “Mituna, please, this is not cool! It's not - “

“I'm jealouth!” He screams, and whips around to face her, yanks his helmet off and pitches it on the ground angrily. The scarring on his face stands out grey and bloodless against his flushed yellow of his cheeks. “I hu-hate him band, no, and he'th better than me and you – you'll rrrrrrrealize and then, you'll leaf me f-f-for him anyway so I might as well. Just. Go first.”

“Mituna, no, that's crazy, I would never ever do that.”

“You'f been doingit for w-w-weeks!”

“Tuna, no!” She reaches out for him again and he jumps back, hands up like a shield to protect him. From her. He was protecting himself from her. “No,” she repeats, quietly. Uselessly. She'd been wrong, and he was right to say so but that didn't mean she was ever going to leave him for – for what, for a matespritship with Cronus? Revolting. It was black and only black. But she can't get Mituna to see past his jealousy.

He walks away, again. She doesn't try to follow.

* * *

 

“So then you all up and walked the hell off, didn't say shit back?” Kurloz' voice reverberates in Mituna's broken mind with a sound like bones, and the violaceous midnight sky. Mituna isn't sure how he knows how those things sound, but that's what his moirail's voice is to him now. It's been so long that he doesn't remember what he used to sound like before. “Holy motherfuck, my most wickedest brother, is that all up to mean you went and broke up with her?” Even with his eyes all flashing chucklevoodoo so he can do the mind-talking thing, Kurloz looks obviously taken aback. Clearly even he never imagined that would happen.

Mituna's lip wobbles. “I donno,” he mumbles, “I just went and hid and waitered, ugh, no, waited for you to come back tho I could tell you.” It had been a long wait, too, a day and a half sitting hungry and cold in some smelly abandoned hive no one ever went to, just so he could avoid everyone. Now he's pacing, too amped and fidgety to sit down with Kurloz on the blanket pile.

“Shee-it, ninja brother mine, maybe you ought to get your talk on to my sweet kittybitch, what this is, is gettin' to sound like her kind of motherfuckin' red romance type situation, dig?”

Mituna frowns. “I wanna talk to you, 'Loz, you're my moirail.” He doesn't want to talk to Meulin, she doesn't know how to keep her big mouth shut about anything. If he says one word to her everyone's gonna know it to death by next week. And anyway he isn't sure he wants to feel flushed anymore, even though it's in him deep like groundwater. It's all streaked with grey and doom now and he doesn't know how to do that, he's never known how to do about that and it's making him uncomfortable. Kurloz knows about ashes and spades better than anyone.

“Arite, brother, say no motherfuckin' more. It is and it god damn shall be done, all hail, in the grand and grotesque design of the motherfuckin' angel of double death.” He holds both hands up to the roof in praise, “can I get an amen!” Kurloz finds a way to preach in any conversation, but Mituna doesn't mind. He's used to just tuning it out. It's a little like his own stutter; if you get used to it, it starts to just make plain sense anyway.

“Amen,” he mutters, because he knows it makes Kurloz happy.

“Church!” Kurloz says, and pauses. “Fuckin' yeah.” Nods to himself, happily. “Let's pop you a Faygo, snap that shit open like a laughsassin, get you a righteous chill on.” Kurloz pulls a Faygo out of his miracle modus without looking and tosses it to Mituna. It's Mango-Tango, of course, Mituna's favorite. He pops it open and takes a sip. Only a small miracle, but it cheers him. Kurloz grins up at him as best he can with his stitched-up mouth. “See? Motherfuckin' miracles already.” Mituna can't help but shiver a little. He'll never get used to how much that looks like it hurts. “Sit yourself down, brother, got these pillows here what's hellacious comfy. Let's up and get our pale on like wicked money.”

Mituna plunks down next to Kurloz and leans against him comfortably, still sipping his Faygo. He sighs, can't think of what to say, how to start.

“Shoosh to the pap, my man, shoosh to the pap.” Kurloz croons, reaching over and papping Mituna gently on the cheek. “Amen.”

“Amen,” Mituna mutters. The shooshing helps. The buzzing in his head subsides a little and he does his best to collect his thoughts, but it all comes out all higgeldy-piggeldy even still. “I dun WANT to break up with her I love her forever she's my rad girl but she lied and ith doomed I slaw it, and, she wanth him I know it, even though she told him passed tents and shes gonna forget me if she does and, and maybe we could be ashes, I think the asheth quadrant could be a thing and then I wouldn' lose her, right?”

Kurloz frowns, parsing Mituna's slip-slide slush of syllables. “You sayin' you want to up and go be their auspistice, ninja brother?”

“Maybe!” he wails, losing composure. “I, I mean, I awlready told them but she said no cause -“

“Cause you're gonna be motherfuckin' losin' her at your flushed quadrant?” Kurloz guesses, frowning.

“Yeah,” Mituna says.

“You all up and want them to stop bein' black that bad?”

“I'm gonna lose her anyway ith doomed, all doomed,” he moans.

“Hell, brother, what the motherfuck do you keep getting' that rude and ridic idea from? Skater girl wants the fish motherfucker black like wickedness for sure, but you ain't gonna lose your red quadrant if she sticks with that. You keep talkin' like she's gonna dump your ass for him in the red and I am not seein' it.”

“But she'th gonna I know it!” Tunnel vision, pinpointing down to visions of doom again.

“Girl kept on comin' right back after the drinker babe, am I wrong?”

“Iono why! I jutht know she's gonna leave when she finds someone better! I saw it!”

“And the drinker babe wasn't better?” The question stings.

“Kind of! I dunno! She came back anyway, I dunno why, Kurloz, I just donno.”

Kurloz sighs at him and rubs his temples. Mituna curls up, making himself small.

They argue the point in circles for a little while. Mituna stubbornly clings to what he knows is doomed to be true, even though Latula's told him otherwise, even though Kurloz keeps patiently explaining how right she is; Mituna just can't manage to shake the notion that Latula will leave him for good as soon as she finds someone better and he's dead set on believing it's Cronus.

He loses the thread of what Kurloz is saying and sinks into his aspect, swimming in visions of his matespritship doomed, doomed, doomed. Cronus is better than him, even if it kills Mituna to admit it – even if he is the worst troll in paradox space, he's still better than Mituna. At least Cronus can talk and stand without flopping around like a fish (how ironic). He can even do music. Shit, he could probably learn to skateboard better than Mituna ever did; Mituna's pretty sure Cronus would do it too, just to make him angry.

“BROTHER,” Kurloz booms in his mind. Mituna jumps, losing his train of thought. “You ain't listenin' to what I'm sayin'. Can't be much motherfuckin' help if you don't listen strict at my glorious revelation, isn't that all the truth? None so deaf as him who will not sit his ass down and hear the word of the angels, all praise to the mirthful messiahs! No, no, there is none so deaf. Got to god damn listen, my homie killa.”

“Sorry,” Mituna mumbles, and hunches up even smaller, wishing he could disappear.

“Aite. Up and sip you some Faygo while I drop some grievous wisdom at you.” Mituna obediently takes a swig of his soda. “Way I see it is, you got you some motherfuckin' options. One,” and he holds up one skeleton finger, “motherfuckin' option one is, walk the fuck away. Shit ain't worth what kinda stressed it's all makin' you be, all kinds of especially if it's doomed what like you say.” Mituna opens his mouth to protest and Kurloz puts a finger to his lips. “Shut the hell up and get your listen on, brother mine.” The lowblood shuts his mouth.

“Good. It's wicked clear that ain't gonna happen, brother, no matter what kind of ridic heresy you're all up and spouting about doom like you can see the motherfuckin' future for real.” He pokes Mituna gently in the chest. “So motherfuckin' flushed for her you could see that shit from space, all flagrant fuckin' bright as hell. Ain't take no redrom kittybitch to tell that at you, and that's tight money.”

“Yeah,” he mumbles. It's true. He loves Latula more than life itself and this is why it's so damn hard to even think of her being with someone else.

“Option motherfuckin' the second,” Kurloz rumbles on, “you all up and auspisticize them, get your grey quadrant on. Pulls you out your flushed quadrant, no more pity and no more pailin',” he smirks, and Mituna frowns, “just heinous hard fuckin' work keepin' them apart.”

“No more pity,” Mituna repeats, softly. He'll miss that. He'll miss the pailing too, but when it comes down to it, he'd miss the pity more.

“No more pity,” Kurloz agrees, “and if you can't get to hackin' the sicknasty agony of the ash quadrant, can't handle how it hurts to keep them apart, you're all up and liable to lose her there too. Then you wind up with nobody left in no quadrants, double-doomed for sure.”

“No, no, NO!” Mituna explodes, jumping out of his seat on the blanket pile, panic setting in. Kurloz doesn't get it, Mituna doesn't want to be without Latula. What would he do with himself? That's why he wanted to be their auspistice; it's all doomed anyway, so better to have her in his grey quadrant than nowhere at all. “I don't wanthat, no! I love her 'Loz, I want to be with her I just can't cause it's doomed!”

“Mother fuck, my most palest brother, you're all getting' to spill mad heresy like blood at me and I grow weary of it indeed.” Kurloz tilts his head at Mituna, eyes all flashing Faygo shades. He taps a finger on his sewn-up lips and then points it at Mituna.

“What?”

“You love her?” Mituna nods. “All red for her like Redpop Faygo?” Nods again. “But you see doom so you got yourself all dead-drunk on motherfuckin' fear and you go runnin' all atrocious for ashes.”

“But -”

“LISTEN at me when I get to preachin' the legit sickest scriptures at you!” Kurloz booms over him, flattening Mituna's wailed objection, “in the name of the mirthful messiahs I swear I never saw a homie more dead fuckin' set on flatnasty ignorance than you!”

Mituna hugs his arms to his chest, cowed by the outburst.

“Pull your motherfuckin' think pan together for a tick and consider this, brother – what if the thing what's been causin' all your hellacious visions of doom is motherfuckin' YOU? Im'a preach it to you, homie, this theory is wicked tight, so listen! You know it by what it's name is at, it's being a self-fulfilling motherfuckin' prophecy, see? You see visions of doom, but you ain't see WHY, you ain't see HOW. You just see and what you get to doin' to avoid what you see gets twisted into what is the CAUSE of the very motherfuckin' thing itself! All your panickin' and runnin' around is the very CAUSE of all your panickin' and runnin' the hell around, palebro!”

Kurloz' thunderous preacher voice is a storm in Mituna's mind. Clarity follows like sundown after a blinding-bright day, and he looks at Kurloz in surprise. Kurloz grins back at him, stitches stretching.

Mituna goes to open his mouth but Kurloz shooshes him again. “Don't get all to wastin' it on me, homie, I see the light of prophecy in you, wicked brother mine! All hail the mirthful messiahs, all hail they who bring the calm of dark into the brutal light that scorches sightless our eyes, all hail the darkness that soothes so the blind may open their mother fucking eyes! Can I get an amen!”

“Amen!” Mituna shouts, caught up in in the preaching. But instead of getting up, he bites his lip and hesitates. “She still lied,” he says slowly, carefully, rationing this clarity he's scraped together, “and he's still awful.”

“Amen!” Kurloz says, “Amen, brother, yea, both of them sicktwisted things is true. But shit, don't you motherfuckin' think it's worth tryin'a fix?” He grabs Mituna's shoulders and gives him a shake. “Ain't doomed unless you say it's motherfuckin' doomed. Stop motherfuckin' runnin' around panickin' and get you an apology, homie killa!”

* * *

 

Cronus' bruises have bruises. His whole body's an aching symphony of violet, every movement another chord of pain reminding him of his double humiliation at Latula's hands; beat down and rejected all in the same two minutes. He'd never expected her to be able to hold her own in a fight, let alone take him out like that, and all in front of Mituna, as if he needed the extra embarrassment. Three days later and he's still spitting mad at the sheer injustice of the whole thing.

He rubs the bruise on his neck, wincing. Mituna had deserved everything he would've gotten; you don't just call a man of his lofty position a chumbucket and expect him to take that sitting down. On top of which, caste-based insults like that always triggered his extreme species dysphoria, because they reminded him that he was still a troll and not a human like he truly and deeply felt on the inside (and thank goodness for Kankri reminding him that it was a serious emotional issue which definitely was not fraudulent in any way shape or form). But no, the little mustardblood gets to spout off whenever he wants and it's somehow always Cronus' fault.

He strums his guitar angrily, curling his lip at the stark ugliness o f the sound. Good, but not quite what he's going for. He adjusts his seat on the edge of the creaking wooden bridge, tweaks the strings and tries again, this time producing a chord both nasty and appealing. Perfect. Just the thing to express his innermost feelings of being totally pissed off and in no way heartbroken by how cruelly Latula had dangled the possibility of actually being interested in being his kismesis before viciously ripping away the carrot of her black affections. And also by how thoroughly she'd kicked his ass.

The whole thing was probably just an act to torment him anyway, he tells himself, strumming another angry chord. But that means acknowledging that she had never been interested and he'd never had a chance, and there was no actual way that was true, because he was a gorgeous and sexy seadweller and was also a really cool guy all-around, which Latula would have the chance to see if she wasn't blinded by her totally nonsensical devotion to that brain-broken gimp. He goes back and forth on the issue for awhile, working through the tortured logic of how exactly it was all entirely Latula's fault, only half paying attention to his guitar.

“Hey Cronus!”

He jumps, whipping his head around to look behind him while simultaneously attempting to zip his coat up to hide his neck injury. Against all odds he manages this, but in the process he forgets he's holding his guitar and drops it painfully on his injured knee. Fortunately he has a guitar strap or it would've gone straight down into the water below.

Cronus manages to turn his strangled howl of pain into a greeting: “Aaaaahonestly Meu, you keep doing that, you gotta stop. One of these days you could scare a guy to death. Not me of course on account of my excellent health but you know. Somebody.”

“Oops,” she giggles, covering her mouth with her sleeve, “sooooooooorry Cronus!”

He rolls his eyes and sets his instrument down. “And keep it down a little,” he reminds her, but he knows that's a lost fucking cause like no other.

“Sorry!” she shouts, grinning. She does not comment on his extensive and varied collection of bruises and contusions, for which he is equally grateful and ashamed. If he had won the fight, he could be humble-bragging about his incredible combat skills right now, but he lost spectacularly and he knows it. From the deliberate way she is not commenting, he can tell she knows it too. It bites his ego to know that she's trying to protect his pride; it shouldn't need protecting, not from a lowblood like her.

He closes his eyes and massages his temples, gathering himself. “Okay, okay.” He looks up at her with a wide and friendly smile. That's better. “What's new, pussycat?” What a great line. It was a shame he couldn't use it to pick her up (even the distant sweeps-past memory of Kurloz' reaction the one time he'd tried still hurts like a bitch), but it was fantastic nonetheless. Human culture was just great.

Meulin plunks down next to him. “Purretty much the same as usual! I have been thinking about all the hypurrthetical ships that my gay human babies could have with each other and they are all just so cute! I'm having trouble even picking my fafurrite one! I have so many feels, Cronus! SO MANY!” She practically wriggles in glee and Cronus can't help but smile for real, just a little. She's so excited about everything all the damn time. It's infectious, even for a seriously cool and collected guy like him.

“Oh yeah?” He doesn't really give a rat's behind about her gay human baby shipping, but maybe he can find an opportunity to casually steer the conversation towards his quadrant issues. He sets his guitar down next to him carefully, far away from the edge.

“MOGMOGMOG yes!” And before he can say another word, she launches into a catpun-filled exposé on the latest updates about her gay human babies. He zones out trying to find the best place to interrupt.

“And this one loves this one but then the other one doesn't love him back,” she rambles on, tugging at her ears in exaggerated frustration, “but he is being so sneakretive about it when it would be so much better if he litterally just came out and said it! And then they could work out all their problems and be matesprits propurrly! Aren't humans so silly?!” She looks over at him, clearly expecting enthusiastic agreement.

It takes him a second (okay, maybe more) to zone back in. Her wide grin drops just the tiniest bit as she finally notices his visible boredom. But honestly, how could she expect him to pay attention for that long? Women. “You know, Meu,” he says, alert at last and seizing the only chance he's seen in the last lord knows how long, “that actually reminds me of, uh, some problems a friend of mine uh -”

“Oh yesssssssss!” she giggles, “I heard a little about your caliginous woes!”

“What!” When he finds out exactly who has been gossiping about his completely private quadrant issues this time he is going to write the angriest song about them and all their totally embarrassing private personal flaws and then put it anonymously under their respiteblock door for them to find and be incredibly upset about.

“Kurloz mentioned it to me!”

He changes his mind about the song.

Crossing his arms huffily, he looks away from her to emphasize how hurt he is. “That is really unfair of you as a friend, you know, to be talking about me behind my back.”

She shrugs, grinning happily. “Sorry! Kurloz mentioned it and you knooooooooow as a Mage of Heart I cannot resist trying to nudge my furriends into ships! I want evfurryone to be happy, Cronus!” She leans over and squishes her face between her palms excitedly. “Tell me all of the things! I know it is a blackrom problem and that's really more Kurloz' specialkitty but I will try my very best to help you!”

He sighs. There's no escaping her when she starts making faces like that. He spills the whole sordid story, right from the top, all the way down to his war wounds (he feels marginally better about his bruises when he calls them that, and if he makes the fight seem a little more evenly matched than it was, she doesn't try to call him on it and he is grateful).

Unlike Cronus, Meulin listens attentively, nodding and asking encouraging questions at all the right times. He feels a twinge of guilt – she's his friend, next time he should make more of an effort to listen to her. He will, he decides. Except if she talks about gay human babies for another hour, because honestly, what kind of man can be expected to sit through that?

“Wow Cronus, that is kind of a cat-astrophe!” She fluffs her long hair and tilts her head sympathetically.

“Yeah, you can say that again. And keep it down!”

“What are you going to do about it?!” she asks, volume steady at eleven out of ten.

“Me? They're the ones who should be doing something about it,” he scoffs.

“Maaaaaaaaaybe! But don't you think you could do something too?!”

“About what? About Latula beating me up? About that mustardblooded drooler calling me a,” he lowers his voice, “chumbucket? How is that in any way my fault?”

“Well, it kind of seems to me like those things happened beclaws you were picking on Mituna!”

“So what if I was?” he says petulantly, flopping back onto the bridge and staring up at the half-busted sky. The cracks in space, formed by an ultimate and unstoppable evil, remind him of the even bigger cracks in his fragile pump sponge, also formed by an ultimate and unstoppable evil - females. What a great metaphor. It would make a perfect song title – “Lord English Couldn't Break Paradox Space Half As Hard As You Broke My Pump Sponge, Honey, And Believe Me He Tried”. He makes a mental note and wonders which girl to show it to first.

The catgirl shrugs again. “It is not a sneakret that Latula and Mituna really love each other! You don't even knead my Heart powers to see that!”

“So?” he interrupts.

She sighs impatiently. “Cronus, I am trying to tell you something but it is hard if you don't listen to me.”

“Okay, so, they're in love. So what.”

“Sooooooooo, maaaaaaaaaybe picking on Mituna is not the smartest most helpful thing to do if you are trying to impress Latula! In fact I bet the best way to impurress her now would be to apawlogize to him! And then to stop being so mean to him all the time! His brain is all messed up so maybe you should cut him a little bit of slack!”

“Who says I'm trying to impress Latula? I'm not trying to impress that bitch.”

“Augh!” Meulin sticks her face right in close to his, blocking out his view of the stars. She's trying to be serious but she looks kind of silly all upside down frowning at him. “Cronus you are impawssible! I know you are trying to impurress Latula beclawse it is obvious! And beclawse I am a Mage of Heart! But mostly beclawse it is really, really obvious!!! So you should start by apawlogizing! Gosh, Cronus!”

“You know what,” he says, pushing her back so he can stand up, “I don't think I want your help. I don't even need your help. I'm not trying to impress anyone. A girl like her would be lucky to have a humble and talented guy like me as her kismesis! And I am NOT going to apologize to that puke-blooded moron!” He grabs his guitar angrily and starts walking away, ignoring her crestfallen kitty face. He's going to go brood somewhere else where meddling meddlers like her won't try to meddle in his deeply private personal issues and tell him to apologize to spazzy lowbloods. As if!

* * *

 

Latula's doing sick grinds all alone, deep in the dreambubble where it's easier to avoid everyone. She's trying to distract herself and failing miserably. She's pretty sure her matespritship is over for good, and she knows it's all her fault. Mituna hasn't talked to her since the fight with Cronus, and it's been almost a week now. She feels lost, and so far from radness it's not even funny. Every cool thing she likes to do, she does with Mituna; what is she even supposed to do without him around to laugh with?

Then: a shout she recognizes as Meulin's always-up-to-eleven voice. Latula groans inwardly. It's not that she doesn't like Meulin (she's so cheerful it's hard not love her) but she really does not want to talk about shipping right now. She forcibly summons her raddest smile anyway; gotta keep up appearances. Maybe if she looks happy enough, Meulin won't ask about Mituna.

“Latula! I've been looking fur you efurrywhere!”

“Yo yo, cool cat!” Latula says, waving. “What's the sitch?” She loops around and pushes on up the ramp for the rail again.

“Come fur a walk with me! It's hard to talk when you're skating around in circles like that!”

“Why, like, what's up?”

“I hear that you and Mituna are having some purroblems and I wanted to help!”

Latula skids to a stop and looks at Meulin. So much for keeping up appearances. “It's mad personal, Meu. Nothing against you but it's like, way just a thing between me and Mituna, you know?”

“Are you suuuuuuuuuuure? I bet I can help work it out!”

“Meulin - “

“Latula!” Meulin stomps, cheeks flushing adorably green in anger. “Kurloz told me that Mituna came to talk to him and if Mituna can talk to someone about it I think you can too!”

“He did? What did he like, tell him?”

“Kurloz wouldn't tell me in case I said to you! But he said it would pawsibly be helpful for me to see if you wanted to talk!”

Latula's conflicted; she doesn't want to open up to Meulin, font of gossip that she is, but if Mituna went to talk to Kurloz about it, it must be a good sign. So maybe she should too. She sighs. Maybe it would be better than keeping it bottled up, even if it means letting herself be vulnerable. “Okay.”

“Yesssssssssss!” Meulin punches the air happily and Latula can't help but smile a little. What a goof.

She kicks her board into her arms and joins her friend. “Where should I even start, yo?”

“At the beginning is usually good! Beclawse that's where things started, silly!” She sticks her tongue out.

Latula rolls her eyes, but she starts at the very beginning and tells her everything while they walk: defending Mituna from Cronus and enjoying it too much, realizing she felt black for Cronus, avoiding telling Mituna because of his anxiety, the fight where it'd all come out. Mituna breaking up with her. It takes a long time, and she loses track of where they're going. She lets Meulin lead the way, which she does between gentle questions and quiet listening noises. For a loudmouth, Meulin is a good listener.

“It's all such a hot mess,” Latula says, summing it all up. She's pinching the bridge of her nose in an effort not to cry. “I mean, like, it is the least rad thing, you know?” She looks around, trying to calm down. Meulin's led them across the dreambubble to a strange landscape all full of lily pads and marble stairs. It must be from her own memories, because Latula doesn't recognize it at all.

“Can you think of any way to fix it, purrhaps?”

“I don't even know,” she groans. “Like, I've tried to apologize and Mituna just way the hell is not listening, it's complete talk-to-the-hand city and he's never ever been like that before to me,” now she's rambling, talking fast in the hopes that she won't cry because pinching her nose didn't help. She's just so exhausted and she misses Mituna so much. “And I wish I could just get him to understand that he's my rad boy and I love him and he doesn't have to be jealous.” She takes a deep breath, trying to compose herself. “And obviously it would help if Cronus would fucking apologize and stop like, being such a complete asshole to Tuna all the time.”

“It kind of sounds like efurryone needs to apawlogize!” Meulin exclaims thoughtfully.

Latula gives a desperate half-laugh, half-sob. “As if Cronus ever would, the chode. Gotta say, I'd be pretty impressed if he like, actually did apologize. To Mituna. Like totally actually sincerely I mean, you know?”

“Do you think Mituna would let him?” Meulin asks.

Latula frowns. “I'm not sure, Meu. I'm really not. I haven't seen him in days, it's totally never been like this. I like, have no clue what he's thinking.”

Meulin smiles. “Maybe it is time to find out!” she says cheerfully, and Latula realizes that Meulin has been steering her carefully this whole time, herding her even (do cats herd things?), because they go up some inexplicable marble stairs and there's Mituna. His hair's all a-fluff, and he's sitting on a lily pad with his helmet beside him, looking for all the world like he's been waiting for her. He scrambles to his feet.

Latula's jaw drops. “Meulin, what - “ but Meulin shoves her forward instead of answering.

Mituna catches her gracelessly with both hands and kisses her and it's so much like the first time they kissed she can't decide if she wants to laugh or cry.

They'd been skating together, eons ago; so long before everything that Mituna didn't need his helmet yet. He'd always been the clumsy one even before the injury. She always loved how he would just laugh off every spill and try again. She could never quite master that, even if she only wiped out on the rare occasion. Looking stupid in front of anyone just pissed her right off.

She'd fallen off her board doing a grind, and he'd fallen too, right on top of her. It was too absurd to be real, she'd thought, until he grinned at her so proud and she'd realized he was trying to make her laugh. So she'd kissed him, because it seemed like the thing to do.

She hadn't been wrong then or now.

* * *

 

Mituna has missed her soft lips and the little noises she makes and the feel of her against him, the way she makes his pump sponge beat like a drum. He's missed Latula and he can't believe he thought his jealousy was more important than being with her. He can feel her shaking against him and to his surprise, he's trembling too.

“T-t-tulip,” he whispers, when they finally pull back. “I mithed you.” Cringing inwardly, hoping against hope she'll say it back.

“I missed you so much, Mituna,” she says, and leans forward to kiss his cheek. He can see tears shining in her eyes and has to blink away his own.

“I love you,” he blurts, clear as day, and he can feel his cheeks burning mustard-yellow. “I'm thorry, I'm thorry, Tulip, I d-d-didn't mlean to herd, no, hurt you.” And it's all spilling out now, a rush-tumble of slurried words he's not sure even she will be able to follow, “S'not fair for me t-t-to get all crazy when you fleel, ugh, feel black for people. Itth sc-scary for me. I donut want you to leave me b'hind and your so a-a-amazing, I just...” he shrugs in her arms, trailing off. “It gets like awl I thee ith doom.”

“I way should have listened better, babe. I mad fucked up. I should have told you. I shouldn't have spent all that time fighting with him instead of being with you. And I should have apologized more, before.”

Mituna takes a deep breath. This next part is harder to say. “You should be kithmeses with whoever you want to be kismethes with. 'm thorry. I trutht you, I dew.” Bites his lip, starts again, enunciating: “I do.”

“Oh Tuna,” she says, and pulls him closer, “I don't want him anymore anyway, not if he's going to act like that to you. I bet he hasn't even tried to apologize.” Mituna shakes his head. “What a coward.”

“I shoudn'a thaid the thing about the chumbucket,” he mutters.

“Maybe,” Latula says, “but he still needs to apologize.” She pauses thoughtfully. “Let's go make him apologize, yo! Right now!” She grabs his wrist and goes to pull her along with him.

Mituna pulls back: he doesn't want to go anywhere just yet.

“I mithed you, Tulip,” he says. “W-w-wun apology doesn jutht make us a-a-all okay. D-d-don't goa running off. Thtay here for awhile.”

She stiffens, and for an instant he thinks they're right back at square one, but she stops and lets his wrist go. “Sorry, I – sorry.” She takes half a step back and nods. “I'm such a chode. I'm getting ahead of myself trying to like, protect you by making him apologize. Way not cool.”

“I know hat, um, that's what you're t-t-trying to dew. B-b-but rite naow all you nead to do ith stay right here with me. W-w-we can worry about him apawlogithing layter, okay?”

Latula nods. She looks like she has something stuck in her throat she wants to say.

“What ith it?”

“If he, totally like, actually apologizes to you, I mean really actually properly,” she says, slowly, “I might like, still want to -”

Mituna leans forward and kisses her, softly. “I k-k-kinda thot tho.” There's a lump in his throat even still.

“But like, only if he agrees never to pick on you again!” she adds, defensively.

Mituna swallows the lump in his throat, tries to speak but it hurts so he nods instead.

“Are you sure babe? Only if you're sure, I promise.”

He swallows again. “Y-y-yeah, Tulip. As long as yew d-d-don't ignoar me fore him anymore.”

“Never,” she says, “never, never ever, okay?”

And he believes her.

* * *

 

Cronus takes more than two weeks to drag himself back to Meulin, tail between his legs. He wouldn't have done it at all if he hadn't kept seeing Mituna and Latula back together, all smiles and laughter, and realized just how alone he really is. She shrugs and tells him to apologize, and says that the fact Mituna and Latula are back together is proof positive that it works. When he complains that this is the same thing she told him before, she throws up her hands and he stomps away to brood.

It takes him another three tries at this before it finally sinks in. Meulin is right. There really is no other way. He is going to have to swallow his pride and tell Mituna that he is sorry. Just the thought makes his grey skin crawl.

Apologizing in person is unthinkable. How embarrassing! Instead, he takes the dignified route and leaves an apology note under Mituna's hive door. It takes him one hundred and eighty-six minutes exactly to write it, and it is twelve words long (one of them is five syllables, which Cronus thinks ought to count for extra). He feels this is satisfactory, and wants to shred his respiteblock to pieces when he finds it returned intact with “fuck you Cronus” written on it in bright teal.

How dare she refuse his apology! How dare it be so incredibly caliginously attractive of her to do so in such an aggressive manner!

He tries more notes, longer ones; every single one returned with yellow and teal expletives scrawled all over. He tries chatting to them over Trollian, but is repeatedly blocked. He tries passing messages through friends. But no matter what he does, each and every attempt is rebuffed as insufficient.

“Meulin,” he groans, having turned up at her respiteblock at far past her bedtime, claiming romantic desperation as an excuse, “how's a guy supposed to apologize if no one will even hear him out?” He tells her everything he's been doing, all in a rush.

“Oh! My! Gosh!!!” she buries her face in her hands and shakes her head.

“What!” Cronus demands.

“There is just no other way to say this, Cronus! Your apawlogies are completely awful!” she tells him, grabbing his shoulders and shaking him.

He curls his lip and thinks about shoving her hands away. People shouldn't just be putting their hands all over a man of his position. But they're friends, and he is here for advice. Besides, he almost feels more grounded when she does it. The feeling is unfamiliar, but soothing, so he lets her be.

“You are so awful!” she continues, shaking him again, snapping him from his reverie. “It's no wonder they won't listen to you! You are barely even trying! Do you even mean your apology or are you just trying to get laid?!” Meulin must be exhausted, he realizes, he's never seen her this worked up before.

He smiles sheepishly and rubs the back of his neck. “Maybe, uh, a bit of both?”

“Ugh, Cronus! That is it! This is the last time I help you! You have to make it huge!” She spreads her arms wide. “You have to make it obvious!” She wiggles her fingers. “You have to make it actually be sincere, so don't even bother if you don't mean it! And I bet it wouldn't hurt one bit if you made it kind of embarrassing for you to do!”

“Why - “ he says, stopping short and blinking stupidly when she puts a hand over his mouth.

“Shhhhhhhhhhh!” she says, holding a finger up to his face. “Shh.” It's the quietest he's ever heard her speak. He feels strangely compelled to shut the fuck up and stay that way. “For a smart guy you can be purretty stupid sometimes, Cronus. Your apawlogies all suck beclaws they are little and scared and more about you feeling better than about being humble and making things right with Mituna and Latula.”

He tries to talk, but she clamps her fingers down tighter. There's a preacher's fire rising in her eyes now, cat fangs flashing as she talks, and Cronus is actually a little bit afraid. “An apawlogy is not about making you feel better, it is all about making things right, Cronus! One dumb little note is not enough to do that! You knead to do something big and obvious and stupid to show them you are sincere and that you care more about apawlogizing than about your own ego!”

“I care about more than my own ego!” he shouts, pushing her hand away.

“Excuse me if I find that hard to believe, mister shows-up-far-past-bedtime-to-wake-up-Meulin-with-problems-he-should-be-able-to-solve-himself! Oooh,” she stamps her foot, “you're so full of yourself!”

“I'm not - “ he tries to speak, but she puts her hand over his mouth again.

“Shh!” she says again. “Of course you are! You are always talking over and interrupting and thinking you are sooooooooooo right and the most important person all the time! Other people are important and right too Cronus! So you need to go do something stupid looking so that your apology isn't just more of you being full of yourself!”

She squints at him in silence for a moment, then removes her hand.

Cronus stares back at her, opening his mouth to protest.

Meulin raises her eyebrows.

He closes his mouth and bites his lip. It's hard to admit, but, now that he thinks about it a little, what she said isn't wrong. He does always think of himself first. He does interrupt and talk over and neglect to listen. Worse still, he does those things to her all the time and she never stops listening to him no matter what. Here she is on her doorstep in her fuzzy kitty pyjamas, far past her bedtime, still trying to help him out despite the way he's acted. To her, and to everyone.

“Shit, Meu.” He licks his bottom lip. “I'm an asshole, a real closet case. I deserve a knuckle sandwich for how I've been treating you. You always listen to me and I'm always tryin' to interrupt you.” He takes a deep breath, wanting to hang his head. “I'm real sorry,” he says, looking her right in the eye instead.

“Good!” she smiles, and he smiles back. “That is a purretty good start!”

“I know what I gotta do now,” he adds, hopefully, looking for approval.

“Purrfect,” she says, “now for fuck's sake get off my lawnring so I can go back to sleep!”

* * *

 

Latula and Mituna are skating, deep in the dreambubble where no one ever seems to bother them. It feels like ages since they got back together, even if it's only been a few weeks. It feels normal again, just like it used to. It feels good. They've got their hella rad video game tunage up to the max, they've got their sweet rail grinds on, and they've got each other.

There's a shriek of feedback and the sound of a loudspeaker crackling to life.

They turn in unified surprise to see Cronus, guitar in one hand, plugging a cable into his amp with the other. “Okay if I turn that off?” he asks, pointing to their sweet boom-box.

“What the fuck do you want, Cronus?” Latula says.

He sighs. “I'm here to apologize, okay?”

“You?” she laughs, “Apologize?”

“I know, I know, it sounds fuckin' stupid, I know. But just gimme a minute, okay?”

Latula looks at Mituna. “It's up to you, babe.”

Mituna folds his arms. “Whun minite.” He holds up a single finger. “J-j-just one!”

“Yeah! All right, mate!” Cronus grins, and while it's still eighty percent bullshit, that's a solid twenty percent of sincerity, which is up from his previous record high of none whatsoever.

Suspending her better judgement, Latula pauses the tape deck.

Cronus licks his lip. He really does look a little nervous, Latula thinks. She's marginally impressed.

“Okay,” he says, “this is for the guy in the yellow jumpsuit in the front row.” He's layering bravado on thick, but the waver in his voice is readily apparent. He shifts his weight uncomfortably.

There's an awkward silence. “Oh yeah,” he says, and hands them a box from his sylladex. “For uh, if you don't like it an' all.”

The box is full of the customary tomatoes thrown at a terrible performer. Latula can't help but smile, and Mituna takes one happily, tossing it up and down in his hand clumsily.

“Like, whenever you're ready or whatever,” Latula catcalls.

“Okay,” Cronus repeats, cheeks flushing violet. “Okay, so, this one's called 'Meulin Said If I Apologized I Might Get Laid So Consider This An Apology.' “ He clears his throat.

“You arrogant dickweed, what the f-” But then he starts singing.

“So Meulin pointed out that I'm kind of a jackass/it might just be because inside I think I'm trash but/it really doesn't matter/all in all I should have left you alone/whoa/all in all I shoulda left you alone.”

In his defense, the whole song actually is, against all odds, a pretty good apology.

Mituna throws the tomato anyway, and hits Cronus square in the jaw. “ 'pology axepted,” he says.

Cronus looks astonished, and even Latula's a little surprised. She was half-expecting Mituna to change his mind about being okay with Cronus if he apologized. He must really be sick of all the fighting.

“Seriously?” Cronus asks, jaw dropping.

“Yup. You thounded pretty fucking thtupid and I'm gonna p-p-put the video on GrubTube so everyone can hear you s-s-singing about how you're a jackass so I guest, gueth, no, guess, it's ok.” Mituna holds up his oblong chatter device and grins as he drops that bomb. Latula smirks proudly; it was his idea and everything. Cronus was so caught up singing he didn't even see Mituna with it.

“GrubTube?” Cronus pales.

“Yeah finhead, GrubTube.”

“Hey, cool it, mate! I sing you an apology in public that you're gonna put on GrubTube to embarrass me and you go calling me slurs?” Cronus narrows his eyes. “That don't touch home at all!”

“Hate to agree with the jackass, but he's not wrong,” Latula says. And he's not. Mituna's the least to blame for everything that's happened these past few months, but Cronus is right – it still isn't fair for him to be dropping slurs like that. If Cronus can apologize in public like an adult, Mituna can hold his tongue.

Mituna frowns. “Ith hard. In my brain.” And Latula knows it is, knows that sometimes he just blurts stuff out without meaning to. But she also knows that he uses that as an excuse sometimes. “I can't,” he says.

“You can try, Tunez.”

He pauses. “Yeah. Okay I'll try,” he says reluctantly.

“Good enough, mate.” Cronus sticks out a hand, apparently in a conciliatory kind of mood. “Friends forever? Shake on it?”

Mituna sticks his tongue out.

“Okay, fair enough, buddy, maybe next time,” he says, still laying it on thick as hell. “All right, now that we've all decided to respect each other regardless of our respectively lofty or not-so-lofty positions on the hemospectrum, I've got one more song for today.”

“Oh, boy,” Latula groans.

“Hey, shut your pie-hole, lady, this one's for you.”

She throws a tomato at him and grins.

“This one's called 'Lord English Couldn't Break Paradox Space Half As Hard As You Broke My Pump Sponge, Honey, And Believe Me He Tried', and it goes out to the dame in the blue dress.” Mituna and Latula roll their eyes but sit down to listen, and Latula even finds some only-partly-stale grubcorn in her sylladex to munch on.

In his defense, the song actually is, exactly as expected, pretty stupid. Latula hates it, so Mituna's happy.

“So?” Cronus says hopefully, raising his eyebrows and grinning. “Was Meulin right?”

Latula looks over at Mituna. He shrugs unhappily. She knows he still doesn't like it, but they trust each other. He believed her when she told him how much she loves him, how much she missed him when they were apart. He knows that if he's in her flushed quadrant, it doesn't matter who's in her black, because she's always going to be red for him. Always. She leans forward to kiss him when he nods just a little, smiling wobbily at her.

“I'll always come back to you,” she whispers to him, then turns to sneer up at Cronus. “You're harsh gonna have to do better than that if you want to impress me, loser!”

“Oh yeah?”

“Yeah, play something worth listening to!”

“All right! Ladies and gentlemen, this one is for the broad who keeps yelling from the mosh pit,” he says, strumming a chord. “It's called 'I Hate You, Please Die.”

And she laughs like hell and throws grubcorn at him.

In his defense, the song actually is, against all odds, a pretty good song.

 


End file.
